NBA Teams That Should Be Tanking During 2017-18 Season
As the NBA free-agency craze grinds to a slow halt, not every team has a firm grasp on where it stands. This is great news for the ones that do—particularly when they know there's no chance of playing meaningful games next season.
These squads have the luxury of accepting and then reacting to their place in the league's food chain. The Association's foremost juggernauts are too dominant for lottery formalities to meander aimlessly into the regular season, hoping to strike lightning in a bottle. You're either within striking distance of a playoff berth, or you're not.
And if you aren't, it's a good time to start tearing things down, even if only for a season.
There are a dearth of tankers thanks to the hierarchies in the Eastern and Western Conferences. Too many might-be playoff squads make up the East, while an excess of star-powered organizations dominate the West.
Franchises won't be tripping over themselves to reach the bottom at the start of the year. This creates a window of opportunity for those who needn't wait around to uncover their identity. They see the writing on the wall, know they're headed nowhere special in 2017-18 and can own it before anyone else does.
Honorable Mentions
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Indiana Pacers
Whenever you're forced to deal a top-20 player without another superstar safety net in your possession, it's usually a pretty good time to bottom out. After moving Paul George for a return that didn't include a future first-round pick, the Indiana Pacers shouldn't be an exception to the rule.
And yet, they're trying to be.
Accepting a package built around Victor Oladipo and Domantas Sabonis was a clear sign the Pacers wanted to continue chasing victories in the Eastern Conference. If that slap in the face didn't register, the two-year deals they gave Bojan Bogdanovic ($21 million) and Darren Collison ($20 million) should. And if their decision to waive Monta Ellis for some reason confuses you, the trade for Cory Joseph clears it all up.
This brazen play for 35 to 43 wins was inevitable. Larry Bird told ESPN.com's Zach Lowe before resigning as team president that Indiana doesn't have the luxury required to stage a contrived demolition.
But there is value in sucking up a one- or two-season plunge now. Though the Pacers have positioned themselves for squeaky-clean books by 2019, they have never been a hub for big-name free agents and aren't bad enough to draft in a slot known for yielding transcendent talent. If anything, they've succeeded in prolonging the inevitable by a year or two—which, barring a lot of luck, also sets them up to waste some of Myles Turner's best, and cheapest, years.
Orlando Magic
A deliberate tank job is out of the question for the Orlando Magic.
Collecting losses like Pokemon cards does nothing to help them pass meaningful judgment on Aaron Gordon and Elfrid Payton, both of whom will be due raises before next season. Paying players who put up numbers on a sub-30-win team is risky business. Conversely, moving on from prospects because they failed to produce on a squad built to lose also isn't an efficient form of decision-making.
That the Magic are unsure of what they have in Gordon and Payton at all is further support for them not tanking. Their draft-day track record since trading Dwight Howard in 2012 isn't good. They've yet to unearth a cornerstone. There's hope for Jonathan Isaac, but Gordon, Payton and even Mario Hezonja no longer carry that cachet.
The East is uncertain enough for the Magic to cross their fingers. Get hot with their mix of youngsters—plus Bismack Biyombo, Evan Fournier and Nikola Vucevic—and they might flirt with a playoff appearance. At the same time, they could be bad enough as is to rival last year's 29-win pace.
This is the beauty of the Magic's suboptimal situation. They needn't decide now. They don't have to decide at all. The East's pecking order will make the decision for them in advance of the trade deadline.
Atlanta Hawks
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The Atlanta Hawks are already circling the "Bottom Out" button.
Er, excuse me, the "Investing In The Future" button is what I meant.
"We don't want to concede to losing," Hawks general manager Travis Schlenk told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution's Chris Vivlamore. "I think a lot of times that what the term rebuilding means, you are conceding to losing. We don't want to do that. We want to be competitive every night. The term I like to use, we are investing in the future."
This is an admirable stance, and the comically crummy Eastern Conference often rewards those who try. But the Hawks are soaking their feet in the tanking waters; they might as well cannonball into the deep end.
Three members of last season's most frequent starting five—Dwight Howard, Paul Millsap and Thabo Sefolosha—are gone. Tim Hardaway Jr., who eventually worked his way into the opening lineup, is busy being overpaid by the New York Knicks. These five, together, represented more than 40 percent of Atlanta's minutes.
Screw remaining competitive. The Hawks are nearing an organic pivot point after hemorrhaging key talent. Sophomores DeAndre Bembre' and Taurean Prince must now get serious burn out of necessity, and big man John Collins is nothing if not a shoo-in for the regular-season rotation following his summer-league splurge.
Racing to the bottom is, quite frankly, more convenient at this point. Find a home for the three years and $54.3 million left on Kent Bazemore's deal, and the Hawks are there. And if they can't move him, so be it. Prioritizing minutes for Collins over Dewayne Dedmon and Bembre' over Marco Belinelli might do the trick on its own.
Chicago Bulls
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Similar to the Hawks, the Chicago Bulls are so close to staging an organic tank job.
Trading Jimmy Butler and waiving Rajon Rondo has left them entirely dependent on a collection of kiddies, Robin Lopez and Dwyane Wade. Their starting lineup figures to look something like Lopez, Wade, Kris Dunn, Zach LaVine and, as of now, Lauri Markkanen or Bobby Portis.
Even in the East, that's probably not good enough to crack the 35-win benchmark.
Then again, maybe contract-year Zach LaVine averages 30 points per game while Wade balls out and a Dunn-Lopez duo props up an average defense.
That is the Bulls' nightmare. They shouldn't want to sniff 35 wins. Hovering around the 25-victory baseline is more their speed. They need the bump in the draft-day order after failing to snag an extra future pick as part of the Butler blockbuster and don't have a bunch of assets they can parlay into supplementary first-round goodies.
Chicago has to be proactive in light of these circumstances. There is no overreacting. Buy out Wade, just in case he adds more digits to your win column. Shop the heck out of Lopez, who still offers good value at an average of $14.1 million per year. He might land a low-end first from the right team. (Sup, Boston?)
Passing on a new contract for restricted free agent Nikola Mirotic is a good idea too. Give his minutes to Markkanen, who looks primed to help lose games after his summer-league struggles. If Mirotic's price tag is too good to ignore, the Bulls should not be above trading him when his restriction (presumably) expires on Dec. 15.
Combo forward Michael Porter is considered the top prospect in next year's draft. The Bulls need someone like him. This isn't hard. They have a chance to enter the worst-record conversation—particularly if the Brooklyn Nets ruin the Boston Celtics' year. This is no time for subtlety or, in the case of Wade, pride to get in the way.
New York Knicks
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Maybe the Knicks are good for a third straight accidental tank. Remove Carmelo Anthony from the current roster, and they should struggle to tally 30 wins. That's a fine place to be.
Still, they shouldn't chance it. Naturally bad teams can sometimes wind up with respectable records in the East. Slumping squads can turn things around on a whim if they have enough competent talent. The 2016-17 Miami Heat are proof.
Leaning into the tank is the Knicks' smartest play, and fortunately for them, it shouldn't be too difficult. They haven't done any irreversibly positive damage to their roster.
Getting Anthony out of town is step numero uno. New general manager Scott Perry and team president Steve Mills have kicked around the idea of keeping him, according to ESPN.com's Adrian Wojnarowski, but Anthony still wants out. And for the love of next year's first-round selection, the Knicks should just give him what he wants.
Extracting a small ransom's worth of picks and prospects from an Anthony trade no longer matters. Refusing to take on long-term salary should be New York's only stipulation. Otherwise, flip him for expiring or clearance-rack spare parts and be done with the world's most tired soap opera.
One of the Cleveland Cavaliers and Houston Rockets should be able to construct a three- or four-team deal that does this much. The losses the Knicks rack up as the result of Anthony's departure will be their reward. They don't have any additional inbound first-round picks, and Kristaps Porzingis is extension-eligible next summer. This is the perfect time to tank, land a top-five selection, regain some goodwill with Porzingis and impress free agents with a budding stable of assets.
Granted, shipping out Anthony alone may not be enough. Porzingis is that good. Unicorn-plus-bench units outscored opponents by 10.9 points per 100 possessions last season. Small samples heavy on second-string pushovers must be taken with a tub of salt, but New York should cover its behind anyway.
Re-signing Ron Baker rather than grabbing a more established veteran mentor for Frank Ntilikina is a good start. On the off chance the Phoenix Suns hate winning trades, the Knicks should give up their reported pursuit of Eric Bledsoe, as reported by the New York Post's Marc Berman. Dangling the mostly reasonable contracts of Courtney Lee (three years, $36.8 million) and Lance Thomas (three years, $21.4 million) for a pick, prospect or cap relief is a more prudent use of the trade market.
Phoenix Suns
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The Suns have already gassed up their two-ton tank. They just need to push/turn/voice-activate the ignition.
All signs point toward the Suns eventually embracing a controlled nadir. They removed themselves from the Paul Millsap sweepstakes to inevitably become a dumping ground for unwanted contracts, per Wojnarowski, and general manager Ryan McDonough's recently announced extension affords him the job stability to play the long game.
Committing to a full-blown reset won't take much. The Suns don't even need to move most of their veterans if there isn't a strong market.
Tyson Chandler and Jared Dudley essentially signed on knowing they could become mentors. They (probably) won't gripe about losing minutes to a combination of Dragan Bender, Marquese Chriss, Josh Jackson and Alan Williams. Brandon Knight, meanwhile, hasn't played well enough to adversely impact a tank job. He's working off a season in which he shot under 40 percent overall and finished as one of the Association's 25 least valuable players, according to NBA Math's total points added.
Eric Bledsoe is the only player standing between the Suns and rock-bottom nirvana—and they seem to know it. They talked about trading him to the Denver Nuggets ahead of the draft, according ESPN.com's Chris Haynes. Those negotiations should resume in some form. The Nuggets, of all possible suitors, are uniquely positioned to fork over a pick, prospect and salary filler that won't end up being a win-column springboard.
Offloading a fringe star like Bledsoe will sting. But he turns 28 in December, and his free agency will be here before Phoenix knows it (2019). He won't hold as much trade value as an expiring contract after next season, and it just so happens the Suns won't find a better time to orchestrate a nosedive.
At least 11 Western Conference teams can talk themselves into making a playoff push next season. That number climbs to 12 if the Dallas Mavericks don't start selling off their own pieces. The Los Angeles Lakers and Sacramento Kings are the only squads with clearer paths to losing, and the former isn't a threat to the Suns. The Lakers will send next year's first-round pick to the Philadelphia 76ers no matter what, so they won't be making a beeline for the West's dungeon.
Bake in the declining value of the Miami selection Phoenix owns (top-seven protection), and this isn't even a decision. The Suns have kiddies to play and no way to stave off a lottery appearance anyway. Bear-hugging the tank is a no-brainer.
Sacramento Kings
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Adding Vince Carter, George Hill and Zach Randolph does not disqualify the Kings from the tanking conversation. The idea that signing them to nurture the youth and reinvent the culture somehow makes this team a threat in the Western Conference is laughable.
"These deals may thread the needle in bringing veteran mentors who won't produce enough wins to derail the tank, or clog Sacto's cap sheet beyond this season," Lowe wrote. "The Kings are still going to be really bad."
Hill is the only new addition capable of throwing an oversized wrench in Sacramento's should-be tank job. Head coach Dave Joerger can chain rookie De'Aaron Fox to the bench, and Hill could end up being the primary pilot for a top-12 offense that grinds out 28 or more wins.
But that's not a genuine risk. Hill will still be surrounded by eight to 10 players with two years or less of experience, and none of his fellow veterans are splashy enough to author that many unnecessary wins.
Besides, playing Hill doesn't give the Kings an excuse to bury Fox. He's not that kind of point guard. Nearly one-quarter of his shot attempts came off the catch last season. Before that, in 2015-16, more than one-third of his looks were spot-up opportunities. He can, and should, and will, work off the ball for stretches while Fox learns the ropes.
That doesn't mean the Kings shouldn't safeguard themselves against going rogue elsewhere. Sussing out new digs for the very tradeable Kosta Koufos and Garrett Temple would ensure that Bogdan Bogdanovic, Willie Cauley-Stein, Buddy Hield, Justin Jackson, Skal Labissiere and Malachi Richardson receive as much spin as possible—a necessary part of any tanking venture.
And please don't misinterpret this as an optional approach. The Kings don't control their own pick in 2019. They have a one-year window in which to tank and secure a top-three or -five prospect. Dragging this thing out to 2020, when their draft stash is no longer in the red, increases the likelihood they make an erroneous acquisition or are forced to reinvest in some of their younger talents before getting an ironclad hold on their direction.
Dan Favale covers the NBA for Bleacher Report. Follow him on Twitter (@danfavale) and listen to his Hardwood Knocks podcast co-hosted by B/R's Andrew Bailey.
Stats courtesy of Basketball Reference or NBA.com. Other salary information via Basketball Insiders and RealGM.
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